Now or Never
by Deestructive
Summary: When Kiyoshi entered his living room one Tuesday afternoon after school, he really didn't expect to see three foreigners on his couch, watching his TV, reading his manga, and eating his favourite candies. Nor did he expect calling the police about it was actually the wrong thing to do. OCs. Pre-Manga.


CHAPTER ONE

The First Summer I:  
_Meetings_

* * *

Kiyoshi Teppei is a patient boy – well, he is one, to an extent. He is still a kid, though. A ten-year old kid who just wants to play basketball. But because he is a ten-year old kid, he can't.

"No," the older boy tells him. "We're not playing with a brat."

"I'm not a brat!" Teppei protests.

"Yo, Kazuo," the older boy friend's calls, "Shake the brat off already! I want to play a quick game before my date with Naruko-chan~!"

"Get lost already," Kazuo says. "No one gives a shit if you're tall or not, you're still a brat and if you get hurt I don't want your parents butt-hurting us about it later."

Teppei nearly gasps from the foul language emitting from Kazuo's mouth. His grandmother always told him to never, _ever _swear. She also said that only bad people swore. He pouts. But then that means that these kids were bad kids…

He sighs, defeated. He picks up his bag and walks away from the court. Even if they're bad, they're still good at basketball. All he wants is to play against some strong people. He's tall for his age and very, very skilled. Despite this, it seems he can't catch a break. Everyone his age are much too weak and complain when he beats them, and the ones who _are_ his age and _are _good enough to play against him live too far away. The only capable players are the older guys who keep refusing him.

"I just want to play against strong people!" Teppei complains.

Fortunately, by the time he reaches home, he's hatched a plan on how to get the older guys to allow him to play among them. It's ingenious, really. The perfect plan. But when he enters his living room he isn't thinking about that plan anymore. He isn't thinking about_ anything_ anymore.

He freezes in place at the sight of them. There's three of them in his living room. Foreigners, he thinks. One, a white kid, is eating his prized chocolate candies, another, a black kid, is reading one of his mangas from the wrong way, and the third, an Asian, is lying sprawled on the couch.

"_Robbers_," he gasps. He slinks away from the living room, unnoticed. He enters the kitchen and reaches for the phone. He dials for the police.

"Hello?" he whispers into the phone. "Yes, I'd like to report a robbery in progress. No, no, they aren't home. Ten-years old. Yes. Okay. Uh-huh. P...Please come quickly!"

-**;**-

"But Grandma," Teppei complains, pouting, "You said that if I see strange people in the house when you and Grandpa not home, to call the police right away!"

The older woman chuckles, leaning back against the couch. The three foreign children seated next to her do the same. Two of them watch Teppei Kiyoshi with curious eyes; the third simply watches him with a mixture of suspicion and contempt. He's the one holding his favourite brand of candy and chews it particularly slowly whenever Teppei looks at him. It's almost as if he _knows_ its Teppei's favourite candy and he just wants to piss him off.

The kid does. Teppei frowns. Stupid kid. The police should've arrested him the moment they arrived at his house.

"But, my dear, they aren't thieves," his grandmother chides him. "I told you that I'd be allowing the children of a good friend of mine to stay with us over the summer."

"It's the beginning of July!" Teppei cries. "Summer break hasn't even started yet!"

"This country is weird," the cruel boy eating his candy remarks. He licks the chocolate off his fingers.

"No one asked you, stupid!" Teppei snaps. He's typically not like this. He's usually a gentle, kind boy – well, to an extent, anyway. But it's hot, he's tired, he forget about his ingenious plan and can no longer remember it, he's in trouble for calling the police when he wasn't supposed to, and that stupid American boy was finishing his favourite candies, dammit! _He's at his limit!_

"Teppei!" his grandmother cries. She's shocked. "Apologize right now!"

He folds his arms over his chest and shakes his head. "_He_ should apologize! He's eating my candies!"

_"Teppei!"_

"No!"

"Teppei, I won't repeat myself—"

"I'd like to say something," says the black boy with the bright red hat – it's way too big for him. He's got weird hair, too. Whatever hair that isn't tucked underneath the boy's hat is very poofy and very, very curly. He's never seen anyone with hair like that before. "In, uh, Kiyoshi-kun's defense, Tam-Lin was purposely taunting him. I, um, saw him."

Teppei stares at the boy. He doesn't expect someone like him to sound so grown up. Or be capable to speak Japanese, really. He's never seen black people speak his native tongue before. The only foreigners who spoke the language that he's met were all white or some other kind of East-Asian.

"Yeah!" Teppei affirms. "He was taunting me!"

The boy called Tam-Lin leaps to his feet. "I was not!" He glares at the black boy and says something in English; it's too fast for Teppei, who isn't all that great in that language to being with. He then lashes out (or it looks like it, at least) at the black kid in English and Teppei's grandmother tries to calm him down. Meanwhile the other kid, Teppei thinks he's Vietnamese, stares at Teppei with his big, curiosity-filled brown eyes.

"Hey," the kid says, "You have stupid-looking eyebrows. You should wax them."

The room is pin drop silent. The kid looks around the room. "What?" he says. "What's wrong? Why is everyone looking at me like that?"

Then something inside of Teppei just snaps. He leaps on the boy and attacks him. It takes his grandmother and the two other foreign kids to pull him off of the boy.

-**;**-

He's been grounded. He doesn't care, though. He likes being in his room. It gives him time to plan a strategic attack against those horrible and mean foreigners. Except for that black one, who turned out to be a girl instead of boy like he originally thought.

Her name is Laila. He has trouble pronouncing it. It's a weird name. Actually they all have weird names. But still, he'll become an ally with her in order to get rid of her brothers (his grandfather, when he came home, explained that they were all adopted), the Korean who called his eyebrows stupid, Yong, and the evil Canadian who ate his candies, Tam-Lin.

He pulls his blue bed sheet decorated with orange basketballs over him and rests his head against the headboard of his be. He touches his eyebrows.

"They're not stupid," he mutters.

The door creaks open. He sees his grandmother at the doorway. She still doesn't look happy. He pouts. He hates when she isn't happy, and he hates it even more when she isn't happy with him. He loves his grandmother a lot.

She sits at the edge of his bed.

"I'm sorry," he says quietly.

"I know," she replies, "And Tam-Lin and Yong apologized as well. Now, I'm going to let you out of your room and I'd like you to try to at least befriend them, alright? It'll make the experience much more fun for all of you. They'll only be here a short time, Teppei."

"Fine."

She smiles at him. "Now, go on."

He kicks his sheets off him and heads out the door. Fine, he'll try to befriend them. He'll try to not hate them. He'll try, he promises. He'll do it just for his grandmother, and only her. But if all else fails, he has his plan. And he will be sure to make the plan work.

He passes by the kitchen and notices someone sitting in front of the fridge. It's Laila.

She looks up at him. "Hey," she says, "Do, uh, you guys have a computer?"

Teppei shakes his head no. He points at the thing in her hand. "What's that?"

"A wireless mouse," she explains. There's a twinkle in her eye. She then launches into an explanation about the mechanics of a wireless mouse. He doesn't understand a word of it.

"I don't care," he states flatly when she gets to explaining about how the mouse transmits its data.

She blinks. "Oh, um, okay."

"How old are you?"

"I don't know, really. Maybe ten."

He laughs at this. "How do you not know your own age?"

She shrugs. "Where I came from, they didn't record people's age."

"And where was that?"

"How old are you?" Laila says quickly.

He gives her a look, but nonetheless answers. "Ten years old."

"Oh, you're the same age as Tam-Lin," she remarks.

"I hate him."

She plays with the mouse in her hand. "Tam-Lin," she says, "Has a lot of problems. But don't let that get to you. He can be a fun person when he's not plotting to get rid of you."

He raises a brow at this. So they had something in common at least. He stares at Laila's hat. It looks old, but somehow retained its colour. "Why do you wear that hat?"

"Oh this?" she pulls it off her head. She has a huge, curly afro. It's remarkable all that hair was able to fit under the hat. "My dad gave it me. It was originally his."

"I thought you were adopted."

"My adoptive dad, then."

He stands. "Well, I don't hate you," he decides. "See ya."

He leaves her sitting there, dumbfounded. "B-bye."

He decides to head outside to the park before it gets too dark. He sees the basketball court he frequents at. He remembers the middle-schoolers refusing to play with him. They're usually playing around this time, but instead he sees Tam-Lin and Yong playing basketball there. He stops and watches them.

Tam-Lin has the ball at waist-level, dribbling it. He has a defiant smirk on his face. Yong watches him, hands stretched out to block any shots. They both stand at the half-court line.

"I'm gonna win," Tam-Lin taunts.

"It's nineteen to nineteen, 'Lin," Yong replies. "Anyway, are you going to stand here forever or are you going to try to shoot? By the way, you should really get some new shoes. The ones you have on smell really bad."

"Che." Tam-Lin fakes to the left and drives past Yong who falls for the fake. He rushes toward the basket, throws, and misses.

He glares at the basket as if it were the reason why he missed. "Dammit!"

Yong retrieves the ball and runs toward the opposite net, but Tam-Lin is right behind him. Yong manages to get to the free-throw line; he bends, he jumps, and takes a shot. Tam-Lin jumps and tries to swat the ball away from its course, but fails.

Yong gets it in.

"I win," he says with a toothy grin.

"Screw you," Tam-Lin mutters. He glances briefly at the fence where Teppei stands, but when he looks again Teppei runs toward the wall adjacent to the fence before he could see him. "Weird…"

"Want to play again?" Yong says as he retrieves the ball. He spins it on his middle finger.

"Nah, let's just go back to Kiyoshi-san's place, it's getting late." Teppei frowns. He's right, it is getting late and he didn't even get a chance to play outside!

"Hey, do you think Eyebrows-chan plays basketball? We could get him and Lai to play against us," Yong says.

"You're got the honorific wrong again, Yong."

"Eyebrows-domo?"

"No."

"Eyebrows-sama?"

"No, dummy, that's not it," Teppei hears Tam-Lin sigh heavily. "But anyway, I like your idea. Playing against you is getting boring."

"That's because you suck."

"I do not!"

"Yes, you do."

"Says the idiot."

"_You're_ the idiot!"

"I know you are, but what am I?"

"Stupid."

"I know you are, but what am I?"

"Stupid!"

"I know you are, but what am I?"

"STUPID! YOU'RE STUPID, _SO SHUT UP_!"

"I know you are but what I am?"

"I'M GOING TO KILL YOU, YONG!"

"Hah! You can't catch me!"

Teppei leaves them to their bickering and practically runs home. He's filled with adrenaline and he doesn't even know why. Well no, he does but he doesn't want to admit it. He doesn't want to admit that he's finally got some strong people to play against. Even if he hates them.

There's a slight smile on his face when he returns home. His grandmother, who is setting the table for dinner, asks him why he's smiling.

"I'm just excited is all," he tells her. "You know, those foreigners aren't as bad as I thought they were. Even if they tried robbing us."

"I'm telling you, Teppei, they aren't robbers!"

* * *

**A/N:** Thanks so much for reading! I hope you enjoyed!


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